Liquid Crystal

Ignasius and Sherri from B2Gold Namibia join the Little Shop of Physics team for a demonstration of crystal growth in a supercooled liquid. The sodium acetate solution is below its freezing point. It wants to freeze, but it needs a seed crystal to get the process started. Once the seed is in place, the fun begins! Ignasius and Sherri were joined by other educators from Namibia as part of a two week workshop with the Little Shop folks. Stay tuned for more videos from their time with us!

[@karlswanson95]

According to David Cahill of Oregon Institute of Technology "The way heat is carried in polymer is related to the diffusion of vibrational modes. In ordered crystals, these vibrational modes travel much further than what is observed in disordered liquids. As a result, an extreme change in molecular ordering of the polymer can significantly alter the thermal conductivity,". I do not know much about liquid crystals but seems to me that if you could align the crystals via electricity in a significantly thick layer you might have a noticeable effect on thermal conductivity, hopefully making it relatively thermally conductive or not through a given path.

[@karlswanson95]

Could you possibly add or subtract ions at the boundary layer of a solid to dramatically increase or decrease the phase transition temperature to a liquid? Going from lower entropy state to higher entropy state would absorb thermal energy and could be used for cooling.

[@happyindian3282]

does this help creating the thermo reactive LCs ?

[@physicsjonestube]

That's a different thing! We called this video "liquid crystal" as a sort of play on words. It's not really a liquid crystal, just a liquid in which a seed crystal triggers a phase change. Thanks for writing!

[@happyindian3282]

@@physicsjonestube whatever i saw, that was magnificent. thanks for posting.

[@gregkirby9059]

can we make liquid crystal transistors???

[@physicsjonestube]

Hmmm... Probably not. But interesting idea!

[@ahmadholidi5633]

What this is meth

[@physicsjonestube]

That's not something we use in Little Shop of Physics.... Sodium acetate! Non-toxic, and fun to play with.